Trevcampbell6891

Okay so i took off after work to go down to the body shop to see how my truck was coming along after the power line accident. Turns out the guy had to leave to go to another town for some other job. So i came back to the house and i see this brown box leaned up against the door. 3 days to get them seemed like 2 weeks to me haha, but anyways they are here and are going in the truck as soon as i get it back. They are the 4-6 inch lift ones that Top Gun Customz has advertised. Hoping to get rid of that 6inch spacer that comes with the RCX kit. Any info on the spacer deal please let me know..It would be greatly appreciated to see and hear if someone has already done this. More pictures of the truck to come! Stock, 6 inch lifted, and then 6 inch lifted with +2 Bilstein shocks.... Next mods are Body Lift, AAL, Tires, Rims, and Gears (4.88's), and in the distance future i'll be looking into the Squires Turbo System (STS).. If everything comes out to pretty much what i expect, it'll have 11 inches of lift and ill be putting on 39.5 super swampers on 20 inch rims.

bonez

I will be performing the same thing this weekend, along with new tires, rims, 6" RCX lift, and fender flares. My Bilsteins are scheduled to be delivered on Saturday, so I'm really hoping they don't get delayed because I'm starting all of this on Friday. As for replacing the 6" spacer with the Bilsteins, Top Gun Customz assurred me that it will work (they have done it before). Good luck!

Trevcampbell6891

Awesome looking forward to seeing your truck! Hope you post up pictures, after getting the phone call that my trucks not gonna be painted till tomorrow.. im sure i wont have it till monday or tuesday. What size tires are you running with the set up? 37's?

bonez

Bilsteins are on schedule for delivery tomorrow...only problem is, who knows when they will actually show up. Probably won't be til late in the day knowing my luck. I got a pretty good start today though. Got the tires mounted on the new rims and got about halfway through the lift. I'll definitely post up pics when it's done.

Trevcampbell6891

Hey quick question, i'm assuming you got your Bilsteins by now. I got lookin at the Top Gun Customz site with the ford that had the rcx lift and the bilsteins that sits on 37's That truck still has the spacer in it..? Just wondering if you had yours in yet and what you thought about it. Pictures of your set up with out the tires on please.

bonez

Yes I have them and they are installed, however, I'm still not done with the lift. I have a bad driver side brake line in the kit and it was plugged so I have to wait til tomorrow for them to send me a new one. Back to the bilsteins though, that was a MAJOR process that I would never attempt again without the right tools.

I attempted to tear down the old stockers since you have to re-use the stock upper and lower seats and the coil spring. I rented the cheap coil spring compressors from advance auto to hold the springs in place as I removed the nut on the top center of the strut. The problem was, the threads were messed up and I couldn't get the nut off, so the cheap compressors weren't the right setup to compress the coils enough to cut the strut rod below the nut. You would need the better compressor (that shops use) that has 3 points where it holds the struts to compress it enough to cut below the nut.

The way I ended up getting them apart was using a torch to cut the rod on the strut. They came right apart then and I was able to put the top section in a vice and force the nut off over the bad threads. The reason for the vice is because when the nut got stuck, the whole rod in the strut would spin as you were trying to remove the nut and there wasn't a way to hold it while removing the nut without cutting the strut in two. Needless to say, I wouldn't attempt this with the cheap rental compressors unless you know the threads on top of the strut rod are in good shape. Otherwise, you will need a good coil compressor or a torch to cut them in two.

As for the blue truck on the top gun site...I am assuming they have a spacer on top of the new struts, but from what I've read, there is a size restriction that you can use if you do this. I think it's only 1.5" or maybe 2" max, so anything bigger wouldn't fit. I talked with a rep from top gun about that blue truck, but I never found out how they got the extra 2". I would assume they used an add-a-leaf in the rear to get the extra height back there. The guy that owned that truck ended up taking the extra 2" off the truck and just leaving it with the 6" kit. I think he might still be running the 37's, but he would have some rubbing issues.

I'm going to run 35x12.50's on mine and I will try to get some pics before I put the front tires on. I've already put the rears on though.

I will definitely post up pics when I get it all done, which should be tomorrow if my replacement brake lines arrive on time.

schissler

Im interested in how this turned out.

i want to replace the shocks that came with my lift for the bilstein 5100s.. my first choice would be removing the front space if possible. if not i will get the regular 5100s and retain the front spacer.

pics! thanks!

Trevcampbell6891

As far as removing the spacer it will do that. But i think you already know that, Thought i seen you post on the other tread... I've been riding around on stock struts and spacers for about 5 thousand miles now so it'll be interesting to see how she rides when i get to put these Bilsteins in. I will take pics and let you know the difference.. People who have done it said it's night and day!

schissler

yeah from what i understood you were just installing the lift and havent driven it before...now that i know this will work i will definately be ordering some!

anything will be better then the stock struts! theyre junk!

Trevcampbell6891

yeah they are! Seems like when you hit a pot hole in the middle of the road going around a corner, it just wants to take you off the other side. Not a fan of that damn spacer for one, and for two im sure its time to start replacing them with 42k on the truck now